1. Field of the Disclosed Embodiments
This disclosure relates to systems and methods for implementing virtual customer replaceable unit monitors (CRUMs) for solid ink customer replaceable units (CRUs) that are used in image forming devices, particularly in managed print service environments.
2. Related Art
All manner of image forming devices make use of customer replaceable consumable products, such as inks and toners, and otherwise include customer replaceable components or units, many of which are routinely replaceable based on a limited service life. In instances, the service life of a particular CRU may be tracked and measured, for example, according to a number of image forming operations that the CRU may undertake. Depending on a level of sophistication in the image forming device, a customer or end-user may be provided some feedback regarding a condition of a limited-service-life CRU, including a remaining level of a particular consumable in the image forming device. Customers and end-users may be provided with alerts to warn them regarding an impending end-of-service-life condition for the CRU, including pending exhaustion of a particular consumable in the image forming device.
Image forming devices often make beneficial use of a capacity to externally monitor the status of the one or more CRUs in the image forming devices. The monitoring of the CRUs is often implemented by way of an electronically-readable module associated with the CRU for uniquely identifying the CRU and for potentially monitoring one or more characteristics of the CRU. Information regarding the CRU can include static information, i.e., information that does not change over the usable service life of the CRU, such as a model or serial number and/or compatibility of the CRU with the image forming device within which the CRU is installed. In some installations, monitoring modules can be used to record, in an electronically-readable format, dynamically changing information relating to a particular operating characteristic of the CRU.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,621 to Richards et al., which is commonly assigned and the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety, discloses CRUs that are augmented with electronically-readable/writable monitoring chips containing static information for identification of the CRU, and/or dynamic information relating to an operating status of the CRU. Richards refers to such electronically-readable/writable monitoring chips as customer replaceable unit monitors or CRUMs.
Richards explains that, when an individual CRU is installed in an image forming device, communication is established with the CRUM located within, or externally mounted to, the individual CRU. The CRUM enables the image forming device to identify the CRU, track one or more characteristics of the CRU by reading data from, and potentially update the information contained by writing data to the CRUM.
Companies that manufacture and sell image forming devices generate substantial post-sale revenue from the separate business of selling replacement CRUs to customers and end-users to which they have previously sold the image forming devices. Based on the significant revenue that may be available in the marketplace for replacement CRUs, recent years have witnessed a significant growth in companies whose sole business is to manufacture, remanufacture, refurbish, refill, or otherwise produce counterfeit or copies of (often referred to as “gray” market) replacement CRUs for use in other companies' image forming devices. The steep increase in the growth of companies manufacturing and selling “gray” market CRUs adversely affects the companies that manufacture and sell the image forming devices for customers and/or end-users. There are measurable economic effects based on the loss of revenue from the customers and/or end-users purchasing replacement CRUs from sources other than the image forming device manufacturers, or those authorized and licensed by the device manufacturers. More subtle, however, are the intangibles such as the potential for an impact on the reputation of the image forming device manufacturer in instances where, for example, specific users experience poor image quality for images produced on a particular image forming device without recognizing that the fault may lie not with the image forming device itself, but rather with the quality of the less-than-optimally-compatible replacement CRUs that have been procured from other sources and installed in the image forming device.
In order to combat the proliferation of “gray” market components, device manufacturers are taking affirmative steps to address the issue. The schemes employed by the image forming device manufacturers may include contractual schemes such as specifically warning their customers and/or end-users that the use of non-company manufactured replacement CRUs in a particular image forming device will invalidate any warranty protection on the image forming device. There will remain, however, customers and/or end-users that are willing to accept voiding the warranty as a trade-off for potential cost savings and other incentives that may be associated with procuring and using “gray” market replacement CRUs.